Bad Information and the Epstein Files

A story behind the (non) story of Ben Bradlee and Jeffrey Epstein

Left to right: Carl Bernstein, Ben Bradlee, and Bob Woodward at a screening of “All the President’s Men” in New York, July 19, 2005. (Credit: Brad Barket/BBC.co.uk)

An alert reader sent me a six-page biography of Washington Post executive editor Ben Bradlee found in the newly released Epstein files, which stated that Bradlee had “worked closely” with James Angleton of the CIA in the early 1950s. What did I think?

I was because, while I wrote in my biography, “The Ghost,” that Bradlee and Angleton were social friends in the 1950s, I found no evidence that they ever worked together. And I knew of no connection between Bradlee and Jeffrey Epstein, though it struck me as possible that Bradlee was the type of establishment figure whom Epstein might try to befriend.

At a time when people worry that the Epstein file story is turning into a “witch hunt,” an understandable but excessive reaction resulting in largely innocent people losing their jobs (like Sen. Al Franken did during the #MeToo moment), I wondered if Bradlee might get similarly dragged.